A new research guide has been added on the Guide to Holdings pages of our website. The latest in the series is on the Naval Knights of Windsor.

Set up to provide support to retired seamen, the institution was intended to operate along the lines of the already established Military Knights of Windsor. In 1799, land was purchased in Datchet Lane for the construction of living quarters for the Naval Knights, and Travers College was built.

However, by the 1860s it was clear that the ideal of devout men living in common was not being achieved. The records reveal many instances of fighting, drunkenness and profane language among the Naval Knights, along with their complaints about compulsory attendance in chapel and their enforced bachelorhood. In 1892, the institution was formally disbanded and the buildings became St George’s School.

Further information on the Naval Knights, including what records we hold, can be found in the new research guide.

Eleanor Cracknell (Assistant Archivist)

Monument to Field Marshall William Harcourt

Field Marshall William Harcourt (1743-1830) was a soldier who fought in the American Revolutionary War. Serving with the 16th Light Dragoons, Harcourt was scouting in enemy territory on the 13th December 1776, when he came across a messenger bearing a letter from General Lee to General Washington. This subsequently led to the capture of General Charles Lee, regarded as one of the most talented American military leaders, and Harcourt’s recognition as a national hero.

William Harcourt’s monument can now be seen in the North Quire Aisle of St George’s Chapel. It stands 76 inches high on a stone base, representing the Field Marshall in his Coronation robes. However, the figure, sculpted by Sievier in 1832, was originally intended for Stanton Harcourt Church in Oxfordshire, but was moved to its current location on the orders of the King after he took a liking to the ‘splendid statue’. Where the original statue was to be placed in the south transept of Stanton Harcourt, now stands a plaster model, identical to the white marble figure at Windsor.

Despite Britain’s defeat in the American War of Independence, William Harcourt continued to be viewed as a hero, the monument commemorating the honour and bravery demonstrated by him. It was therefore appropriate that his statue would be placed in the Chapel, flanking Deans and Canons, Military Knights, and members of the English Royal Family.

Stefanos Koutroumanidis (Archives volunteer)

The Sisters of the Scabards

The Sisters of the Scabards Holiday is the title of a short pamphlet which was published in 1641 [SGC RBK S.372]. It was one of several satirical pamphlets which circulated in the summer of 1641 after Dr William Roane was disgraced and exiled from Doctors’ Commons (a college of lawyers who practised civil law). The charges of corruption and extortion brought by the Long Parliament against Roane and his fellow civil lawyers, John Lambe, John Farmery, Edmund Peirce and Clement Corbett, destroyed not only their own reputations but also undermined the authority of Doctors’ Commons itself.

The title employs a catchphrase, ‘Sister of the Scabard’, taken from a popular contemporary comedic play about a lawless gang self-styled the ‘Brothers and Sisters of…The Blade and the Scabberd’. The term quickly became a euphemism for a prostitute.

The pamphlet features two brothel-keepers named after areas of London – Mrs Bloomsbury and Mrs Long-acre. They are portrayed as good-humoured characters who tease one another about the size of their bellies after drinking lots of “fat-feeding ale”. They complain about the treatment they have received at the hands of the ‘Gentlemen Clarkes’. Mrs Long-acre describes how these men would get drunk, throw the brothel’s residents out on the street, leave without paying and then summon her  “to appeare in Pauls the next Court day, to answere for keeping a common bawdy-house”.  Forced to pay the officer of the court and the ‘Gentlemen Clarkes’ a hefty fine, she suggests that these actions were merely a money-making scam for the Doctors’ Commons lawyers in the long vacation.

The women conclude their conversation by planning to build a “Hospitall for all of our societie that are old and not able to keepe up trade” with the money they have saved now that they are no longer paying fines to corrupt lawyers.

Kelda Roe (Archives Assistant)